New drugs for migraines as effective as cheap painkillers

A new global study has found that expensive migraine medications that are newer than older painkillers are no more effective than traditional ones. In fact, they're less effective than older treatments like triptans.

A global study reveals that expensive, modern migraine medications are no more effective than traditional painkillers and even less effective than older treatments called triptans.

This new meta-analysis, published in The BMJ, highlights that the newer drugs are not necessarily an improvement over established treatments.

Migraines are debilitating headaches that affect at least one in seven adults worldwide, according to the World Health Organization. They are also up to three times more common in women than men.

Historically, affordable painkillers like aspirin and ibuprofen, along with triptans, which affect blood circulation in the brain, have been prescribed to manage migraines.

Recently, a new class of migraine drugs known as gepants has entered the market. This includes rimegepant, sold by Pfizer under the brand name Vydura, and ubrogepant, marketed as Ubrelvy by Abbvie.

As per the study, these drugs have been positioned as "major breakthroughs," with pharmaceutical companies investing heavily in their development. Pfizer, for example, acquired Biohaven, the company behind rimegepant, for over $10 billion in 2022.

However, these medications have mostly been tested against placebos.

Researchers analysed 137 previous trials that studied 17 different migraine treatments involving nearly 90,000 participants. The results showed that newer, more costly drugs, such as rimegepant, ubrogepant, and lasmiditan (which may cause drowsiness), were only as effective as basic painkillers like paracetamol and anti-inflammatory drugs.

In contrast, triptans - older migraine drugs like eletriptan, rizatriptan, sumatriptan, and zolmitriptan - performed the best.

However, the study noted that triptans remain "widely underused."

The researchers recommended that doctors prioritize triptans for treating migraines. For patients with heart issues who cannot take triptans, they suggested using traditional painkillers like aspirin or ibuprofen.

The newer gepants drugs should only be considered as a third option.

Study co-author Andrea Cipriani from Oxford University stressed the importance of effectively addressing migraines.

"It's the leading cause of disability in young women and is associated with high personal health care and societal costs," he told news agency AFP